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The Instacube is dubbed a living canvas. “Use the Toggle button at the top of Instacube to switch between viewing your own photos, the photos of your friends, [or a live stream of ] the “popular” feed.” Yup, you can hook this bad boy up to WiFi and have a live stream of photos pushed to the display. The Instacube sports a 600×600 pixel touch screen display and operates on the Android OS open platform.

In our L&L Design Guide: DIY Lighting Ideas and Projectspost I highlighted how using fiber optics you could create your own DIY constellation sky in any room in your house. Here Ie have another version – instead of installing it on the ceiling Mr Trick created his star map on a wall, and also the constellations are more compact together creating an even more striking display. To have a look at the instructions on what it takes to build one of these have a look here: Instructables.

Outdoor string lights are great for decorating an outdoor party because they are lightweight and inexpensive. Another great light fixture to use are paper lanterns (DIY Paper Lanterns: Our 5 Favorite Posts). Here are a few ideas on how you can create unique shades for outdoor string party lights and different ways you can use them to decorate an outdoor space.

Origami String Lights

Over at the Wit and Whistle website, they have created paper origami shades to cover LED string lights. The great thing about this idea is that you can create any sort of origami shapes from hearts, to flowers and fit them onto the string lights. LED string lights were used as they give off less heat – link.

Ping Pong

Steven over at Instructables has taken plain colored ping pong balls, and multicolored string lights to create these colorful DIY string lights –link.

Dixie Paper Cup Party Lights

Create party lights by using Dixie cups and scrapbook paper to create a garland – link.

Decorating With String Lights

There are a number of ways you can use string lights to decorate an outdoor party. They can be simply wrapped around railing, trees, or hung over fences or bushes. You can create a curtain of lighting by hanging a number of string lights side by side. Another idea would be to hang string lights in rows overhead which will create a starry night effect. They can be hung overhead either from the walls of the house, from trees, or plant a pole into the soil to hang them from. If you hang the string lights upwards onto a pole you can create a nice canopy/tent effect.

You can easily create festive and colorful party lights by putting glow sticks or battery powered LED lights inside of balloons and blowing them up. These glowing balloons can then be scattered around outdoors (they will even float in pools). Or if you want to go a step further, look to rent a helium tank and buy helium specific balloons from a party store to create floating glowing lights, which can be tied down around the backyard.

Brian Neltner, a graduate of MIT, has outlined the steps he took to create the Saiko5, a WiFi Music Responsive LED Dance Light. You can have a look at the step by step guide here.

The Saiko5 has been used for the Burning Man 2010 and 2011, Temple of Visions in LA, and a number of other events. The photos below are from, where 10 Saiko5 units were used for the Acoustic Combustion installation.

With mood lights you can light the room with yellow sunshine when it grey outside, or paint the walls with a leafy green light to create a nature like setting. A popular choice is the Philips mood light collection.

Philips LivingColors LED Mood Light

The favorite out of the collection is their LivingColors LED Mood Light Lamp. It can produce up to 16 million different shades of colors, by scrolling the color wheel on the remote control. With the remote you can also control the brightness and saturation of the light. It is powered by 7 LED lights and has 2 light settings: 1) your color choice or 2) automatic mode where the lamp fades through the colors. The lamp has a modern design – a translucent sphere, and the cone shape interior design draws heat away from the LEDs allowing it to last longer.

You can also find this same Philips LED mood light design as a wall light, ceiling light and floor lamp. Here is an example of it as a ceiling light. The same features apply to the LED Lamp above – changing colors, remote control, etc.

LED Flowers

Here is something different: a color changing vase. The Philips LUMIWARE Vase has 8 light colors to choose from, or can be set onto a continuous loop to cycle through all of the colors. You have the option to plug it in or make use of the battery power which lasts up to 12 hours. It is waterproof so you can fill it up with water and it works outdoors too.

Philips Lumiware LED Vase

Philips LED Table Lanterns

Lastly we have the Philips Imageo which are LED color changing table lanterns. It is cheapest out of all of the Philips mood lights, at $44. It comes as a set of two, and they can be plugged into the base station or taken around as lanterns as they are also battery powered. They make for great kids night light, which they can also take to the bathroom in the middle of the night as most kids won’t be able to reach the light switch.

Most mood lights consist of shiny, minimalist orbs that can change color to your liking. But decorative lights such as lighted twigs can easily change the feel of a room. These are lights that are shaped like branches and twigs, so even when they are not on, they add a decorative element to a room. When they are on, they provide decorative indoor lighting – much more sophisticated than the overused string lights.

Lighted twig branches are versatile light fixtures. They can be attached to a wall creating a sprawling wooded light feature, or they can be placed into a vase or pot. Here is where you can tailor these light fixtures to the décor style of the space you are putting them in. You have a range of choices on the type of base to use – from Japanese to metal style pots or vases to place the lights in. Or you can go with glass, see through vases and fill them with colored rocks and the branches.

If you want to create an intimate setting in say a bedroom or living room, then it would be best to go with a dark ceramic vase. Glass vases would work well with modern, minimalist décor styles filled with chrome or glass décor pieces. These lighted twigs also work well as restaurant lighting fixtures or even as easy wedding lighting decorations.

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This is a place where I gather ideas on all things lighting (I’m a wannabe property developer). Lights & Lights also has design guide articles writen by industry experts: our most popular topics are Home, Outdoor, and Wedding Lighting Ideas.